


After The End

by DesireeArmfeldt



Category: Canadian 6 Degrees, Wilby Wonderful (2004)
Genre: Alternate Ending, Alternate Universe, Angst, Canon Queer Character, Character Death, Death, Friendship, Grief/Mourning, Guilt, M/M, POV Third Person Limited
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-14
Updated: 2013-07-14
Packaged: 2017-12-20 04:50:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/883145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DesireeArmfeldt/pseuds/DesireeArmfeldt
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Duck grieves.</p>
            </blockquote>





	After The End

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Linger](https://archiveofourown.org/works/884593) by [Luzula](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Luzula/pseuds/Luzula). 



_Maybe next year we’ll have a parade._

The vodka burns Duck’s sinuses as he takes another gulp.  Cheap shit, but he’s not drinking for the taste.  The wind slaps him with another faceful of sea-spray.  Thunderstorm’s probably on its way.  Duck does not give a damn.

_Maybe next year we’ll have a fucking parade._

But the _Sentinel_ didn’t publish the names after all.  Duck’s not sure if Buddy French had a hand in that, or if even those arseholes figured it would be too tacky to sling that particular mud after Dan Jarvis made the front page.

He stares out at the dark waves, trying not to remember the photo of that rope-end dangling from a beam in an empty room.

 _At least they didn’t print a picture of his fucking body,_ he thinks, not a new thought, but enough to warrant another healthy swallow of rotgut.  They didn’t print a picture of Dan alive, either, which Duck ought to be pissed off about except that he’s not sure he could have handled it if they had.

 _Because you’re handling everything great as it is._   He raises an ironic toast to the inky sky.

“You all right?” says Buddy French’s voice behind and above him.

“Go to Hell,” Duck tells him, not looking up.  He lifts the bottle again.

Buddy’s hand closes over Duck’s wrist, surprisingly strong.

“This really what you want to be doing?”

Duck surges to his feet and decks Buddy left-handed.  Buddy goes down with a grunt, hands slapping hard against the wet rocks to save his head.  Panting, Duck stares down at him, the bottle still clutched in his right hand.  He wonders how close he was to swinging the bottle instead of his fist.

“Fuck.”  Buddy rubs his jaw gingerly.  “Feel better now?”

Duck can only shake his head.  It’s not Buddy’s fault Dan chose Buddy’s house to hang himself in.  It’s not Buddy’s fault that his wife was the one to find Dan, or that she found him too late.  It’s certainly not Buddy’s fault that Wilby is the way it is.

“Going to knock me down again?” Buddy asks, reaching up a hand.  Duck takes it silently and hauls the other man to his feet.  When Buddy carefully pries the bottle out of his hand, Duck doesn’t resist.

He ought to apologize, but he doesn’t have the energy, so he just jams his hands in his pockets and stares out at the dark ocean.  Wonders if Dan thought about doing it here: fill up his pockets with stones and walk out into the waves.  Wonders if it would be a worse way to go.

Buddy stands next to him, looking out to sea as well.  After a while, he pulls out a pack of cigarettes, lights one, then offers the pack to Duck, who doesn’t move.  The wind whips the smoke around, gone before Duck can hardly smell it.

“What’d you save it for?” Duck asks.  Because Duck hears things, and he knows the Mayor was talking to developers, and then he wasn’t, and Duck’s seen how Brent Fisher twitches when he passes Buddy in the street now.  “What’s the fucking point?”

“I don’t know.  For our kids, I guess.  So they could have what we had, growing up.”

Duck spits at the ocean.

“Maybe I want to give them a chance to have better than we got, then,” Buddy says.

Buddy doesn’t have kids and Duck never will, but he knows what Buddy means.  It’s how he felt when he held Sandra’s daughter, safe and trusting him and already learning from her mistake the way Duck’s not sure Sandra ever really has. 

But thinking about Emily is next door to thinking about her beside him in his truck, watching Dan come out of the motel and get into his car— _Do you want to say Hi or something?  Nah, I tried that._   Because what do you do, when the guy tells you to get out of his room?  What do you do?  You don’t say, _I’m worried about you, you’re not okay, let me help, let me get you help._   You don’t say, _You shouldn’t be alone_ , you don’t say, _I’m not leaving you alone._   You don’t keep following him like you’ve been doing all day because you knew, you _knew_ what he was thinking.  You don’t do a damn thing.  You let him drive away, to an unoccupied house with empty rooms and strong beams, and you don’t lift a finger to save a man’s life, even though you’re willing to put in the effort to save a stupid kid from the consequences of her own stupid mistakes. . .

He’s crumbling from the inside out, but Buddy has him wrapped in a hug, holding him up, sheltering him from the wind, and Duck gives up and clings to him like a kid.

 _Don’t be sorry for helping Emily.  That was worth doing._   The voice in his head isn’t his own this time; it’s Dan’s, quiet but more confident than Duck ever heard him sound in real life.

“You were worth saving too, you arsehole,” he chokes into Buddy’s shoulder.

Buddy doesn’t say anything, just holds him and pats him on the back and lets Duck’s tears soak into his shirt along with the spray and the first drops of rain.


End file.
